


Tell Me More And More And Then Some

by Amorak



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alive Hale Family, Full Shift Werewolves, M/M, Slow Build, kitsune!stiles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-08
Updated: 2014-07-08
Packaged: 2018-02-08 01:01:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1920732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amorak/pseuds/Amorak
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek isn’t ready to think about the possibility of his kitsune having a human alter ego with a family and a report card. It’s enough to have recently acquired an emotionally traumatized magical fox.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dust to Dust

**Author's Note:**

> Constructive criticism is always encouraged! Enjoy!

Derek is out running on the night of a full moon when he finds it.

He’s alone. He always runs alone these days. It’s not normal, but his mother tolerates it because she knows his wolf won’t allow him to be near anyone but the children on full moons anymore. So Derek runs, dodging trees, chasing scents, allowing his wolf to take him over completely until he feels like he’s losing himself. It’s a relief.

The moon is setting and Derek is on his way back to the house when he passes the nemeton and he smells it. At first he thinks it’s just the tree giving off the sharp scent of magic, but then he spots a dirty scrap of fur lying in the grass like a leftover from some other predator’s kill. He decides it’s worth a detour.

It looks like a fox but it smells like magic. It’s emaciated and so covered in mud it’s impossible to tell what color its fur is. Derek suspects that if it weren’t a full moon and he weren’t in full wolf form he wouldn’t even be able to hear its heart beat and tell that it’s still alive. He picks it up gently in his mouth like he would one of the babies and heads home.

On full moons his mother sits on top of a hill near the house so she can keep a close eye on her pack. Spread out below her are the bonfire that the humans gather around to talk and bounce babies, the clearing where the children roughhouse, and vast stretches of forest where the wolves run and hunt. Derek takes the magic-not-fox-thing straight to her, and sets it at her feet.

His mother drops her nose to smell the thing, then immediately shifts back to human form. Derek follows her lead.

“Explain,” she says.

“I found it near the nemeton. It smelled like this. I brought it to you.” Derek says. They are always terse, and speak in simple, abrupt sentences on full moons, when their wolves are near, if they bother to speak at all. Derek, whose wolf is always close to the surface, speaks like this often. He has a reputation. “It does not smell like a fox,” he says, and feels silly for stating something obvious.

“No, it would not,” she says after a pause, “because it is a kitsune. It is not well.” She looks up at Derek’s father as he drapes a robe across her naked shoulders, and speaks to him. “I will take it to Deaton.”

“I’ll go with you,” his father says, and bends to scoop the kitsune up from his wife’s feet.

Derek snatches the kitsune before his father can reach it. He can’t explain why he doesn’t want him to touch it. But it’s the full moon, and his instincts loom large in his mind. He doesn’t try to form words to explain himself to his mother, just turns to look at her, and bows his head in a silent plea.

“You must wear clothes,” is all she says.

Just like that his uncle Peter is there, clothes in hand, saying “Just try not to get too attached to this one until we decide whether or not it’s evil, hmm?”

***

The ride to Deaton’s is quiet. His father drives, which is unusual. Derek sits in the back with the kitsune in his lap, sometimes working a little bit of mud out of its fur with his claws, sometimes just listening closely to its faint, rapid heartbeat. It never opens its eyes.

When they arrive at the emissary’s office the lights are on. Derek nods gratefully at his dad when he opens the doors for him so he doesn’t have to shift his hold on the fox.

Deaton is standing behind the mountain ash barrier when they enter the building, raising it for them so they can pass. He looks on curiously as Derek gently lays the creature on an examination table and steps back against a wall beside his father. He itches to hover and interfere, but it’s not his place.

His mother and Deaton stand over the kitsune. His mother speaks first. “My son found this kitsune near the nemeton as the full moon was setting. Besides his physical illness, he smells of strong emotion—heartbreak, loss, anxiety.”

As his mother speaks Derek realizes it is true. His wolf had sensed it and felt protective, although his human had not recognized it. He is suddenly ashamed of the way he had tried to protect the kitsune from his father, who is the kindest man he knows. He barely resists the urge to slink out of the room in embarrassment.

Deaton is gently turning the kitsune’s head back and forth. “I admit that this is not my area of expertise, Talia. Kitsune are rare and none have lived on this land for hundreds of years, not since your pack settled here. However, everything I have read indicated that, like werewolves, they are resistant to injury and illness.” He pauses. “Are you entirely certain this is a kitsune?”

“The scent is unmistakable,” his mother replies.

“Perhaps,” Deaton says, “in light of the emotional trauma you have picked up on, he is preventing his own healing powers from restoring him. Again, this is only a theory, but it is something I have seen occur among wolves.”

Derek cringes, and is grateful that only his parents and Deaton are here. None of them look at Derek although everyone knows that Deaton is talking about him. His father just shifts a bit closer to him, close enough to press shoulder to shoulder, and it’s comforting.

“I will need to research,” Deaton continues, “and consult some contacts who have expertise in this area. You may leave him with me if you wish to.”

Derek goes rigid at the idea of leaving the kitsune behind in the cold, white room that smells like antiseptic.

“But I think it would be better if you took him home with you. It’s possible that all he needs to begin healing physically is to be welcomed into a safe environment. I would probably not introduce him to the entire pack just yet. Put him into the care of one pack member, one that he seems to respond well to. Keep him in a calm and quiet environment.”

Now Derek is tense because he’s not certain he will be able to obey his alpha if she tells him to leave the kitsune in someone else’s care. His wolf is conflicted, and the tension has him digging his claws into the wall until—

“Derek.” His mother speaks sharply to drag his attention back to her. “You will care for him.” All at once the tension goes out of him.

“Perhaps Derek could also help us figure out who he is,” Deaton suggests.

“Who he is?” his father asks. It’s the first time he’s spoken since they entered the office.

“Yes,” Deaton replies. “This is an adolescent kitsune. Barely a teenager. He might have a family and a birth record. Friends. He may have even gone to school.”

“I thought that kitsune were like dragons—old, rare, and holed up in a cave somewhere with their stolen goods?” his father said.

“There are several different kinds of kitsune, some of which live thousands of years and barely interact with the world at all, which I believe is what you are thinking of, Michael.” Deaton nods politely. “And others which live nearly like humans, or so I have heard. I will have to learn more before I can properly advise you.”

Derek isn’t ready to think about the possibility of his kitsune having a human alter ego with a family and a report card. It’s enough to have recently acquired an emotionally traumatized magical fox.


	2. Epitaph for My Heart

Derek carries the fox home wrapped in warm towels that Deaton had given him, with instructions to deal with the fox’s dehydration and not let him get cold. “You’ll probably want to give him a bath right away. Don’t. Wait until he’s awake, warm to the touch, and no longer dehydrated.”

 

So Derek gets back and barely wets its mouth down with warm, watered down Pedialyte and rubs honey on its gums. Then he lies down on the bed, settles the fox on his chest underneath his sweater and means to wait for it to wake up.

 

Instead, Derek falls asleep and doesn’t wake until noon. He might be imagining it, but the fox’s heartbeat already sounds stronger than the night before. Derek gives it more Pedialyte and honey and wraps it in the warm blankets Derek has just vacated before he goes downstairs to look for food.

 

The afternoon after a full moon is a family event that Derek would normally avoid at all costs. He resolves to get in and out with a minimum of human interaction, but inevitably runs into a couple of people who want to talk about the kitsune. Laura begs him to let her see it. “Deaton said no,” he says, and glares.

 

Derek tries to head directly to the refrigerator but his mother stops him with a look. “Derek, aren’t you going to join us for breakfast?” she asks.

 

Derek is almost grateful for the fox’s fragile state. “The kitsune is unconscious. It shouldn’t be alone.”

 

She gives him a shrewd look, but nods. “Take some food with you to your room then.”

 

Derek tries not to look pleased with himself. He’s so careful to avoid pack events that he almost never gets to eat his dad’s cooking. He loads his plate down with pancakes and bacon and sets it next to the fridge. He needs to get something for the fox in case he wakes up later. He doesn’t want to have to deal with the kitchen crowd again.

 

He’s not sure what would be appropriate. Liquefied rabbit? Thankfully there are a lot of babies in the house. Derek grabs some jars of homemade baby food out of the fridge, sniffs each one to make sure they’re meat, and sticks them in the deep pockets of his sweat pants. Grabbing his plate again, he pauses to nod politely to his mother, who waves him on, then takes a detour to the entry way closet and grabs a couple large oral syringes out of the overstocked trauma kit they keep in there.

 

He nearly collides with Peter in his hurry to get back.

 

“Taking good care of our latest stray, are you?” Peter says. “How altruistic.”

 

“Fuck off, Peter.” Derek says.

 

“Oh don’t mind me, I’m just the only one in this pack who remembers how close we came to being murdered in our beds the last time you were feeling _charitable.”_

Derek snarls. He’s grasping his plate with his claws now, barely under control, and Peter is smirking. Derek wants to send him through a window. He clings to the fact that his mother chose him to provide a _calm environment_ for the kitsune. He can’t beat his uncle into a pulp on the first day and expect to stay in his mother’s good graces.

 

He puts his head down and walks to his room as coolly as he can manage. By the time he makes it back to his bedroom his food is cold and he’s not at all calm. But as he shuts the door behind him and takes a couple deep breaths, he’s almost able to block out the anger and shame. He sets everything down on his dresser and gathers the fox into his lap. Derek eats breakfast sitting cross-legged on his bed with the still muddy, unconscious fox on his lap, cradling his plate of pancakes to his chest.

***

Derek spends the afternoon looking through the family’s digitized archives for any information on kitsune and getting nowhere. Derek was hoping he might find something to help him figure out where to start looking for the kitsune’s identity, or how to make him wake up, but he can’t even find a passing mention. But clearly both of his parents know about them—his mother has even met one before. Which means he needs to talk to his parents.

 

He shoves his laptop off his lap and onto his bed and takes the fox back out of his sweater, where he had put it again to make sure it stayed warm. He almost drops it when he finds it staring up at him with glassy eyes.

 

“You’re awake.” Derek just stares into its eyes for what feels like hours, before he finally comes to his senses and grabs the Pedialyte. “You’re dehydrated. I know this is emasculating, but if you can deal with it, we won’t have to take you back to the vet.”

 

The fox doesn’t respond. He doesn’t put up a fight, either, when Derek rolls him onto his stomach, wraps him in a towel, and sticks a syringe in his mouth, so he figures that’s probably consent.

 

Derek gives the fox about five drops of water at a time until he empties the syringe, the switches to the watered down baby food. The fox passes out again before he can even start feeding it, but Derek is so relieved to have gotten water inside him he’s almost smiling.

 

Derek’s not sure what to do now. He can’t give the fox a bath until he wakes up again, and he can’t spend the day in the forest because he has to keep the kitsune warm. Derek sighs, and puts the fox back underneath his sweater, then drags his computer onto his lap again. He’ll just have to find something worthwhile to read in the family archives.

 

A few minutes later the kitsune snuffles and stretches, the first indication that he’s actually sleeping and no longer unconscious from sickness, and Derek feels like he relaxes for the first time in weeks. The kitsune’s smell—sharp, magical, nothing at all like the warm earthy scents of the forest—has already become familiar to him, and almost comforting.

 

“Everything is going to be alright,” Derek says to no one, “okay?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FYI: I am not a vet. I am fairly certain that the appropriate action to take if you come across a sick fox would be to carefully trap it in the toolshed of your least favored neighbor and call animal control. But this is a MAGIC fox with super healing powers he's not currently using, so you know, I took liberties. Watered down Pedialyte is a reasonable thing to give a dehydrated cat though. Who knew?!


End file.
